Page 5 of Slaying the Shadow Prince
She blanched.
And that was the signal that whatever this was had gone on long enough. As much as he would have liked to continue rolling around in the dirt with her, he had his orders from the guild. He needed to find and kill the wayward son of the forge master: the man responsible for threatening all that Thezmarr stood for, its very culture and ethos, the protection of the midrealms. The strange buzzing at the woman’s wrist told Talemir that the cuff was ample evidence of the man’s meddling. There was no doubt it had been made with Naarvian steel.
In three quick manoeuvres, he had her disarmed, her dainty hands trapped in his, her back flush to his chest.
‘You were toying with me,’ she breathed.
‘Only a little.’
‘You’re a monster…’
Whatever magic that cuff was imbued with – for it had to be the cuff – was powerful and alarmingly effective. There was no trace of doubt in her words. She clearly knew in her bones what he was, which unnerved him. Not even Wilder knew… But she had no proof. Here, he was all man, all warrior, and nothing more.
‘I’ve been called worse,’ he allowed. ‘Do you yield?’
There was a lingering pause, and he tightened his grip. ‘I know what you are, shadow wraith. I will carve out your heart before the end.’
Talemir gave a dark laugh. ‘I’d like to see you try, Wildfire. Do you yield?’ he asked again.
He felt her against every part of him, stirring something within, and he realised she smelt of lilacs and heather, of a home long forgotten.
‘For now,’ she said at last.
‘Good.’ He released her. ‘Then you can take us to the forge.’
The woman stiffened. ‘What do you want with the forge?’
‘Warsword business. Best you don’t interfere.’
He could practically hear her grinding her teeth, but the woman seemed to understand that he had her beat and slowly, her blue gaze still searing with rage, she sheathed her weapons. Seething in silence, she led them back down the crest of land to where Wilder waited with their horses, and the other man stood awkwardly, his complexion ashen from his encounter with both wraiths and Warswords. The giant hawk watched from a nearby rock as well, its yellow eyes utterly unnerving. Talemir glared at it, the scratches on his face already itching where the blood had dried.
Wilder handed him his reins. ‘What was that about?’ he asked under his breath.
‘Oh, you know by now I have a tendency to cause extreme reactions in women…’ Talemir grinned.
‘That’s usually after you bed them.’
‘What can I say? Perhaps my powers of seduction are stronger in Naarva.’
Wilder snorted. ‘She was trying tokillyou.’
‘Some of the best sex starts that way, my young apprentice.’
The younger warrior rolled his eyes in a long-suffering manner. ‘I haven’t been your apprentice in years. I’m a Warsword now.’
Talemir smirked. He loved baiting the young man. And now more than ever, after the fall of Naarva, after the fall of Wilder’s brother, it was an extra joy to see him shed his shell of grief, even for a moment.
‘You’ll always be my apprentice,’ he said, giving his fellow Warsword a gentle shove.
Wilder shook his head and mounted his horse. ‘You get more insufferable by the day.’
‘You wound me,’ Talemir quipped. ‘Aren’t you forgetting something?’
‘What?’
‘Well, if we’re to reach the forge in the next century, you’ll have to make room in that saddle for one more…’ Talemir nodded to the scowling Naarvian ranger.
‘You can’t be serious,’ Wilder said, not keeping the disgust from his voice.
